The Tulip Tree of Winterthur

Delaware's champion tulip tree is not its tallest, and it does not need to be. The Delaware Forest Service ranks this one first in the state: 50.9 metres high, a crown averaging about 32 metres across, and a trunk 620 centimetres round. Another tulip tree north of Wilmington stands two metres taller, but this trunk is wider by more than 70 centimetres, and on a register that scores the whole tree, girth carries the day. That trunk is the thing to come for. Of the tulip trees we publish worldwide, only one is thicker, at the Biscainhos garden in Braga, Portugal, at 650 centimetres. The big ones we map in Arnhem and Porto sit around 530. And none of those comes near 50 metres in height; this tree is roughly twenty metres taller than the best measured European examples on our map. It grows on the Winterthur estate, the museum and garden about eight kilometres northwest of downtown Wilmington, outside the city. Entry is paid. Four hundred metres away on the same grounds stands Delaware's champion dawn redwood, so one ticket covers two state records. The ranking dates from November 2024, and a dated observation at the spot within the past four years confirms it was alive then. The register carries no age and we have found no planting date. If you know when it went in, or who planted it, tell us.